Thoughts on the evolution of wireless networks and mobile web 2.0

Transit and Interconnect Speeds in Germany in 2013

A couple of days ago I reported about the findings of the 2013 German telecommunication regulators report. Among other things, the report contained two numbers: In 2013, mobile networks in Germany carried a total of 267 million gigabytes while fixed line network carried 8 billion gigabytes. The numbers are staggering but what does that mean in terms of transit and interconnect links required, i.e. how much data is flowing to and from the wider Internet into those networks per second?

Let's take the mobile number first, 267 million gigabytes per year. There are four mobile network operators in the country, let's say one of them handles 30% of that traffic. 30% of that traffic is 80 million GB per year and 219.178 GB per day. Divided by 24 to get the traffic per hour and then divided by 60 and again by 60 to get down to the GB per second that's 2.53 GB/s or roughly 20 Gbit/s. This number does not yet include usage variations throughout the day so the peak throughput during the busiest times of the day must be higher.

On the fixed line side, the number is even more staggering. Let's say the incumbent handles 70% of the 8 billion gigabytes of the year (only an assumption, use your own value here) this boils down to a backhaul speed of 1.4 Tbit/s (1400 Gbit/s) plus whatever the peak throughput during busy times during the day is above the average.